10135. 'And you shall offer the other lamb between the evenings' means a similar removal of evils in a state of light and love in the external man. This is clear from the meaning of 'offering a lamb', or sacrificing it, as being removed from evils by means of the good of innocence from the Lord, as immediately above in 10134; and from the meaning of 'between the evenings' as in a state of light and love in the external man. In the Word 'evening' means a state involving interior things when the truths of faith are set in obscurity, and forms of the good of love are in some coldness; for angels experience different states of love and light, just as in the world different times of day - morning, midday, evening, night or twilight prior to morning, and morning again - give way to one another. When the angels experience a state of love, to them it is morning, and the Lord appears before them as the rising Sun. When they experience a state of light, to them it is midday. When however they experience a state of light set in obscurity, to them it is evening; and when after this they experience a state of love set in obscurity or some coldness, for them it is night, or rather the twilight before morning.

[2] Such states experienced by the angels follow unceasingly one after another, and serve unceasingly to make them more perfect. But those changes are not due to the Sun there, to its rising and setting, but to the state of the interiors within the angels themselves; for as with people in the world they have a desire at one time to turn towards their internal interests, at another towards their external ones. When they turn towards internal interests they experience a state of love and consequently of light in clearness, and when they turn towards external interests they experience a state of love and consequently of light set in obscurity; for what is external is such, compared with what is internal. This is the origin of the changes of state experienced by angels. The reason why they have such states and such changes is that the Sun of heaven, which in that world is the Lord, is the Divine Love itself. Therefore the heat radiating from it is the good of love, and the light from it is the truth of faith. For everything radiating from that Sun has life, unlike the things radiating from the sun in the world, which are dead.

[3] From this it becomes clear what heavenly heat is and what heavenly light is, also why it is that 'heat', 'flame', and 'fire' in the Word mean the good of love, 'light' and its 'brightness' the truth of faith, and 'the sun' the Lord Himself in respect of Divine Love.

The Lord in heaven is the Sun, see 3636, 3643, 4321(end), 5097, 7078, 7083, 7171, 7173, 8812.

The heat from it is the good of love, 3338, 3339, 3636, 3693, 4018, 5215, 6032, 6314.

The light from that Sun is Divine Truth, the source of faith, intelligence, and wisdom, see the places referred to in 9548, 9684.

From all this it now becomes clear what 'morning' and what 'evening' mean.

[4] But it should be recognized that in the present verse 'the morning' implies midday as well, and evening early morning twilight as well; for when the words 'morning and evening' are used in the Word an entire day is meant, so that 'morning' includes midday, and 'evening' night or twilight. This explains why 'the morning' in the present verse means a state of love and also of light in clearness, that is, in the internal man, and 'the evening' a state of light, as well as of love in obscurity, that is, in the external man.

[5] The fact that 'between the evenings' is not used to mean the period of time between the evening of one day and the evening of the next day, but the time between evening and morning, thus all of the night or twilight, is evident from the consideration that the continual burnt offering of a lamb was presented not only in the evening but also in the morning. From this it becomes clear that something similar is meant elsewhere by 'between the evenings', for example, where it says that the Passover should be kept between the evenings, Exodus 12:6; Numbers 9:5, 11, which is explained in yet another place by the following words,

You shall sacrifice the Passover in the evening when the sun goes down, at the fixed time of the departure from Egypt. After that you shall cook and eat it in the place which Jehovah your God will have chosen; and in the morning you shall turn ¹ and go into your tents. Deuteronomy 16:6-7.

[6] The fact that 'evening' in general means a state of light shining in obscurity is clear in Jeremiah,

Arise, and let us go up into the south. Woe to us, for the day goes away, for the shadows of evening are set at an angle! Arise, and let us go up at night, and let us destroy the palaces. Jeremiah 6:4-5.

Here 'evening' and 'night' mean the last times of the Church, when all matters of faith and love have been destroyed. In Zechariah,

There will be one day, which is known to Jehovah, when around evening time there will be light. On that day living waters will go out from Jerusalem. And Jehovah will be King over all the earth. Zechariah 14:7-9.

This refers to the Lord's Coming. The end of the Church is meant by 'evening time'; 'light' is the Lord's Divine Truth. A similar example occurs in Daniel,

The holy one said to me, Up to the evening, [when it is becoming] the morning, two thousand three hundred times. Daniel 8:13-14.

2715. Two arcana exist here, the first being that, compared with the good of the celestial man, that of the spiritual man is obscure, the second that this obscurity is brightened by light from the Lord's Divine Human. As regards the first of these - that the good residing with the spiritual man is obscure compared with the celestial man's - this may be seen from what has been stated above in 2708 about the state of the spiritual man in comparison with that of the celestial man. From a comparison of the two states the fact of that obscurity is quite evident. With those who are celestial good itself exists implanted in the will part of their mind, and from there light enters the understanding part. But with those who are spiritual the whole of the will part is corrupted, so that they have no good at all from there, and therefore the Lord implants good in the understanding part of their mind, see 863, 875, 895, 927, 928, 1023, 1043, 1044, 2124, 2256. The will part is, in the main, the part of man's mind that possesses life, whereas the understanding part receives life from the will. Since therefore the will part in the case of the spiritual man is so corrupted as to be nothing but evil, and yet evil is flowing in from there unceasingly and constantly into the understanding part, that is, into his thought, it is clear that the good there is obscure compared with the celestial man's good.

[2] As a consequence those who are spiritual do not have love to the Lord, as those who are celestial do; nor therefore does that humility exist with them which is essential in all worship and by means of which good can flow in from the Lord; for a heart that is haughty is not at all receptive, only one that is humble. Nor do those who are spiritual have love towards the neighbour, as those who are celestial do, because self-love and love of the world are constantly flowing in from the will part of their mind, bringing obscurity into the good that goes with that love towards the neighbour. This may also become clear to one who reflects from the fact that when he helps another he does so for worldly reasons; thus though he may not consciously have it in mind he is nevertheless thinking about what he will get in return either from those he helps or in the next life from the Lord, which being so his good is still defiled with merit-seeking. It may also become clear to him from the fact that when he has done anything good and is able to speak about it to others and so set himself up above others, he is in his element. But those who are celestial love the neighbour more than they love themselves, and do not ever think about repayment or in any way set themselves up above others.

[3] The good residing with those who are spiritual is in addition made obscure by persuasive beliefs that are the product of various assumptions, which likewise have their origin in self-love and love of the world. For the nature of their persuasive beliefs even in matters of faith, see 2682, 2689 (end). This too is a product of the influx of evil from the will part of their mind.

[4] It may in addition become clear that the good residing with the spiritual man is obscure compared with the celestial man's, from the fact that he does not know what truth is, as those who are celestial do, from any perception. Instead he knows what truth is from what he has learned from parents and teachers, and also from the doctrine into which he was born. And when he adds to this anything from himself and from his own thinking, it is for the most part the senses and the illusions of the senses, also the rational and the appearances present within the rational, that predominate, and these make it barely possible for him to acknowledge any pure truth like that acknowledged by those who are celestial. But in spite of this, within things that are seemingly true the Lord implants good, even though these truths are mere illusions or else appearances of truth. But this good is made obscure by such truths, for it derives its specific nature from the truths to which it is joined. It is like the light of the sun falling upon objects. The nature of the objects receiving the light causes the light to be seen within those objects in the form of colours, which are beautiful if the nature of the recipient form and the manner of its receiving are fitting and correspondent, hideous if the nature of the recipient form and the manner of its receiving are not fitting and so not correspondent. In the same way good itself acquires a specific nature from the truth [to which it is joined].

[5] The same arcanum is also evident from the fact that the spiritual man does not know what evil is. He scarcely believes that any other evils exist than actions contrary to the Ten Commandments. Of evils present in affection and thought, which are countless, he has no knowledge nor does he reflect on them or call them evils. All delights whatever that go with evil desires and pleasures he does not regard as other than good; and the actual delights that are part of self-love he both pursues, approves of, and excuses, without knowing that such things have an effect on his spirit and that he becomes altogether such in the next life.

[6] From this it is in a similar way clear that although the whole of the Word deals with scarcely any other matter than the good which goes with love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour, the spiritual man does not know that that good is the sum and substance of faith, nor even what the essential nature of love and charity is. It is also clear that though something which is a matter of faith may be known to him - faith being considered by him to be essential in itself - he nevertheless discusses whether it is true, unless he has been confirmed by much experience of life. Those who are celestial do not discuss the same because they know and have a perception that it is true hence the Lord's statement in Matthew,

Let your words be, Yes, yes; No, no; anything beyond this is from evil. ¹ Matthew 5:37.

For those who are celestial are immersed in the truth itself about which those who are spiritual dispute. Consequently because those who are celestial are immersed in the truth itself, they are able to see from it numberless facets of that truth, and so from light to see so to speak heaven in its entirety. But those who are spiritual, because they dispute whether it is true, cannot - so long as they do so - arrive at the remotest boundary of the light existing with those who are celestial, let alone behold anything from their light.

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